ABOUT THE EVENT

Calling all grown-ups! 

CFLC’s friends and supporters are invited to gather for an evening of literature, libations, and lively conversations. Our favorite NC writers and entertainers are returning to read humorous and moving literary works. Round up your happy hour crew and join us for this unique storytelling series!

DETAILS

• Dates: Series begins on 9/15 and runs each Tuesday through 10/20
• Time: Doors open at 5 pm; Program begins at 5:30 pm
• Tickets: $20 per event
• Save with a Season Pass: All events in the series for $100
• Location: Azalea Station (1502 Castle St)
• Food & drinks available for purchase
• Q&A with special guest moderators follows each presentation

Proceeds from these events benefit CFLC’s adult education programs, keeping them free for our students.

$20 - $100

Tuesday 9/15

Rhonda Bellamy is the founding executive director and President/CEO of the Arts Council of Wilmington/New Hanover County, serving for over a decade as the heart of Wilmington’s arts scene. She chairs Arts North Carolina, advocating for equity and access to the arts statewide.

Rhonda has received numerous honors, including the White Lotus Lifetime Achievement Award and the City of Wilmington’s Living Legend Award. A seasoned journalist, she is the host and executive producer of “Around Town with Rhonda Bellamy.” Check out the latest episode on WHQR Public Media. 

Tuesday 9/22



Wiley Cash is an award-winning and New York Times bestselling author of four novels, host of the Our State Book Club Podcast, and co-owner of the forthcoming Floodplain Books in Wilmington, North Carolina. He teaches fiction writing at UNC-Asheville and lives in North Carolina with his wife, photographer Mallory Cash, and their daughters. He is the 2025 recipient of the North Carolina Award for Literature, the state’s highest civilian honor. 

Tuesday 9/29

Marlon Ramos is a Wilmington-based storyteller, performer, and community advocate whose voice shows up in some unexpected places. By day, he leads enterprise systems engineering for Live Oak Bank; by night, you'll find him on stage, most recently as Kevin J./Ali in Opera House Theatre Company's production of Come From Away, part of a theater journey that includes roles in Spamalot, 1776, Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, and Peter and the Starcatcher. 

Marlon is a Marine Corps veteran, and he serves as Chairperson of the Board of Directors for DREAMS Center for Arts Education, where he champions creative opportunity and development for young people across the Cape Fear region. A lifelong lover of photography, film, and the stories that connect us, he's thrilled to bring his own voice to Adult Story Hour and share a work that's meant something to him.

Tuesday 10/6

Celia Rivenbark, a native of rural Duplin County, was born 100 yards or so from The World’s Largest Frying Pan in Rose Hill, NC. Try not to be jealous.

Celia is a New York Times-bestselling author of seven humor collections, an award-winning playwright and a longtime humor columnist for Gatehouse Media and, later, Gannett newspapers. She currently writes a popular political humor blog called “Celia Dishes” which can be accessed at celiarivenbark.substack.com. and is enjoyed by readers in 46 states and 17 countries.

Celia is a former CFLC volunteer tutor, and she was a founder of the council’s longtime fundraising Spelling Bee for Literacy. She and her husband, author and retired hospital executive Scott Whisnant, live in downtown Wilmington.

Tuesday 10/13

Anita Thomas moved to Wilmington in 2000 after spending 20 years in Atlanta and believes she has died and gone to heaven. A native Floridian, and FSU alum, she now passes herself off as a Wilmingtonian whenever she thinks she can get away with it.

Her two careers have been in advertising while living in Atlanta, and as the Publisher’s assistant at the Wilmington StarNews for ten years until her retirement in 2014. She began volunteering at the Literacy Council back in the Mardi Gras Gala days and continues today as part of the Amazon Book Seller team. She is also a member since 2006 of Wilmington Toastmasters and serves as club Secretary.

Anita self-published her first novel, Blood Will Tell, in late 2023 and recently released her narration of an audible version, because she loves to read out loud.

Tuesday 10/20


John Jeremiah Sullivan is a writer in various genres who lives in Wilmington, North Carolina, where he co-founded the non-profit research collective Third Person Project. He is the author of the memoir Blood Horses: Notes of a Sportswriter’s Son (2004) and the essay collection Pulphead (2011), which was included by the New York Times Book Review on its list of the 100 Best Books of the 21st Century.

He has been the recipient of several awards and honors, including the Whiting Award, the Windham-Campbell Prize, a Guggenheim, two National Magazine Awards, a Pushcart Prize, and a fellowship at the New York Public Library’s Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers. His essays, stories, and poems have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, The Paris Review, The Oxford American, The Yale Review, and other publications.

He is a contributing writer for the New York TImes Magazine. His next book, The Prime Minister of Paradise, about a forgotten 18th-century utopian experiment, is forthcoming from Random House. 

$20 - $100

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